The bebopper with great chops

There are few portraits more beloved in jazz than that of Dizzy Gillespie playing his upturned horn, cheeks billowing as notes come cascading out. Gillespie skillfully navigated the tight line between artistry and entertainment, spearheading radical changes in jazz technique while remaining extremely popular throughout his career. Despite being self-taught, he had phenomenal technical facility...

Homeless, Friendless, and Penniless

In 1936, the Works Progress Administration (WPA) initiated a program to collect oral biographies from former slaves. Field workers solicited and edited thousands of slave narratives, some of which were sent to the Library of Congress, while others went to libraries in various states. Although most of these interviews have been previously published, in Homeless, Friendless, and Penniless, Ronald...

Briefly noted

In The Great American Tax Dodge (Little, Brown, $22.95, ISBN 0316811351), Time Inc. senior writers Donald L. Barlett and James B. Steele take on the inequities and iniquities of the American tax system. In the tradition of firebrand financial populism exemplified by William Greider's Who Will Tell the People?, they expose the loopholes that allow thousands of people with six-figure incomes to...